Life with Jane

[Wroughtnharv]

This one might be a little wordy and end up stuck in the two bar ether. The last one a couple of days ago I believe suffered that fate. Either that or someone at IRV2 pulled it for some reason or another.

We’ve got everything big out of the house and the painter starts his magic Monday morning. We are wore slick, long days highlighted by 58 mile mornings and evenings. And as the old place looks more vacant the new place begins to fill up.

Wednesday we had a major hiccup. I ran into a business acquaintenance at Home Depot about lunch time. When I explained we were moving and selling Harvey’s House he jumped in with his niece was in town was looking for a place and it sounded perfect for her. They came over and she loved it. He went straight to bottom line numbers for a deal as is where is. The real estate listing contract didn’t go into effect until today so he was all for me backing out of that and it becoming a cash sale between us.

I explained that wasn’t the way I did things but if the real estate agent was covered in the deal and comfortable with not going through her company I would be okay with it. He made her a cash offer for her services and she went with it. He then explained to Glenda that she didn’t have to clean up at all. He had his own people who would clean and paint and I could cancel my deal with the painter. As is where is, all we had to do was take what we wanted and he would handle everything from there. We all shook hands, us, him, RE agent, and talked about word being our honor and Thursday we would meet at the title company to begin a cash deal that would close in no more than two weeks.

I called the painter and he was okay with the deal even though he was losing the work, just happy for us. I called friends and family and the world was a great place. Then the business guy/Baptist preacher called and backed out, Lord’s hand in the deal I guess didn’t work. He mentioned the Lord’s hand in the coincidence of us meeting up at Home Depot and us wanting to sell just at the time he was looking to buy a place for his niece and her loving it.

Needless to say my wife was devastated. We went from hitting the lottery to losing everything in a fire kind of emotional swing. We lost a half of a day’s progress and got to call back the painter and see if he could put us back in his schedule. Wednesday night was a tough drive home from old place to new place.

Last night when we got in it was early 6:30 so I did something I had been wanting to do. I walked into the little house to see how hot it was and then I went to the container to check the temperature. Glenda had reservations about putting some stuff in the container because she was worried about the heat. The difference was huge. Little house interior heat was oppressive to the point of being overwhelming. Container was warm but not oppressive. Point being that if you have a container and you are storing stuff in it the thermal paint works, big time.

It turns out the phone thing is even more complicated than we thought. Our phones were Christmas gifts two years ago. So they are locked into AT&T until Christmas this year, 2 year window. I don’t want to buy new phones and I have to have service. No cable, line of sight and satellite service are too expensive when paying for 12 month service when we’re here only six months out of the year. Verizon’s Jet Pack might be what we are stuck with since two of the places we spend time get Verizon signal fine and AT&T’s are poor to non-existent.

Things are going good. The preacher deal would have been great, two to three weeks earlier start on the new place and a lot less hassle for us getting rid of furniture and cleaning up the old place. But it will work out just fine, we’re using to doing things the way it’s supposed to be done.

[Hit_the_Rhod]

Harvey, sorry it didn't work out. I learned a long time ago that if the business card says "Reverend" anywhere on it, LOOK OUT! If they are sincere, and honest, the "Reverend" part will be displayed in the way they live and how they treat others. No need to print it on a card. The opposite is also true.

[kwittintime]

Very interesting to follow your progress.
Shows hard work pays off.
Keep posting and good luck.

[ronjhall]

Good wish for a fast sale and closing when a good buyer is found.

[Lloyd in S.C.]

Sheesh sorry that deal fell through Harvey. Amazing how some people don't hold much value in their word.

Best of luck finding another buyer!!!! It will work out.

L.

[Wroughtnharv]

Long days and short nights these days it seems. The old house is vacant and the painter and crew attack the interior today, estimate is two to three weeks work. I emptied the dump trailer yesterday with a lot of stuff from the new place. Now I have it at the old place and about half full with stuff from the old place. One of the realities is our vision of furniture and nice/neat stuff isn’t shared with people buying housing these days. So that stuff is going to the landfill. Then there’s the stuff that I made or modified that made sense to us but doesn’t to the buyers today.

Most of the houses in the neighborhood that sold were purchased by Asians. They offered ten grand above asking and have different ideas about homes than native Texans do. They’re much more industrious when it comes to yard work, seem to enjoy doing their own yard work instead of having a service care for it. And they have young children so that is always a good thing. It takes me back when we purchased here and the owners were younger, did their own yards, and we had kids playing in the streets. I hope who ever buys our home appreciates the too many plants, trees, and extras that we have enjoyed. And our home has always been a comfortable place and happy. I hope they continue that trend.

Yesterday the guy giving the mobile home wings contacted me and let me know he finally had the mobile home toter guy over to get a plan going getting it out now here. It would be nice to see it gone and then we can get the new dirt in for the pad of the new place going.

We’re back to the barndominium concept with the little house being something else. We got all excited by the advice on how we could make the little house into a cute little place like they do on the telly. But we’re getting away from that and going back to the original idea of a barn with our apartment inside of it. Once we went back in that direction I offered the idea of the little house being the perfect blacksmith shop. That could be a fun project.

I purchased a Verizon hot spot last night. It sure makes it easier to get online here at the new place. I hope it was a good idea, time will tell. We don’t stream and do videos so I went with the 12 gig plan. We have 20 gig on the AT&T plan and never seem to get beyond 4 or 5 gig on it. But then we’ve had WIFI at home most of the time so I got the extra capacity to allow for that.

It would be a little overwhelming if we weren’t having so much fun.

[ronjhall]

We had 20gb when we traveled. That seems like a lot. But the dam updates to Apple OSI and Apps seemed to eat 1/2 of it up every month. Never went over but it was close some months.
We do not do stream's or video's either.
Now that we are home with unlimited WiFi. Out AT&T data is less than 1GB each month. Our plan is 3gb per month.

[Wroughtnharv]

Originally Posted by Wroughtnharv

Ron, too much of a good thing isn’t always a good thing.

Yesterday was a pretty huge day for Casa de Lacey. One of my old friend’s wife is one of those people that can walk into a place and not only see the potential, but explain it so that everyone understands it. We now have a plan for the little house. It will be approximately 1000 sf with one bedroom and 1 1/2 baths.

I hadn’t went into the attic, plate is full enough already without going up there. What we found was amazing. Rafters are 2 X 6’s, joists are 2 X 10’s, and there was no insulation. Little house has good bones.

Today I have to make up some metal shelve braces for the container and install some shelves. The trailer is supposed to take flight Tuesday. Let’s keep our fingers crossed.

Yesterday a bud called and asked if I wanted any R-19 insulation. He had saved 20 bundles from the dumpster on a his project and if I needed them they were mine. I explained I didn’t need any because we were going to use blown in foam.

Then last night Glenda let me know we weren’t going to build the apartment in the little house but in our bardominium as originally planned. This morning I told her the little house would make a perfect blacksmith shop.

I called bud back today and picked up enough R-19 to cover the attic of the little house. It’s going to be a fun morning tomorrow. Installing insulation is right up there with pulling out errant nails from the nail gun in the hand.

Hmmm, I used the quote feature so the photos would be shown, hmmmmmmmmm

[Wroughtnharv]

This morning I got a call saying they were giving the mobile home her wings this afternoon. I rented a Bobcat and when I got to the new place the coach was still there. Before I got out of the truck a toter showed up with a guide car. I helped him hook up to the coach.

Then I hooked up the Bobcat to the toter because it couldn’t move the mobile home on its own.

They’ll be back tomorrow. I hope it’s early because I rented the Bobcat to clean up where the coach sat.

I’ve never suffered from aerophobia. But I strongly suspect the mobile home is paralyzed by it.

[guardrail53]

Harvey, as long as the "Mobil Home" waits to disintegrate after it has left your property, all's good!
Hope all goes well in the morning! Rail!

[ronjhall]

It will be good when mobile home is gone.

[Wroughtnharv]

The mobile home is out of her nest. She’s on the road, Ester Ln, our own road btw, just out of the nest. As you can see all it took was one bearded man from Oklahoma and his remote controlled tractor to get her out of the home she’s known for at least 26 years. In the photo he’s changing out two flat tires. It was about 4:30, hot, and I knew he was beat. I suggested that he come back this morning and take it away since he had to haul the remote controlled crawler back to the shop and then come back to get the mobile home. Another night wasn’t going to kill us and it looked like pushing it might kill him.

I found the other septic tank system and it was bad. They had some real serious concrete pads in the ground for the front mobile home pad, about eight of them. When I realized that the two septic tanks wouldn’t hide all of the concrete I had on the property to dispose of I dug a pit with the Bobcat. The other thing I wanted to bury was as much of the poison ivy around the mobile home nest as I could dig up.

I had to have the Bobcat back by 4:00 yesterday. I was upset about them not getting the mobile home out before I had to take it back. And I wasn’t about to rent it for another day unless I knew for sure they were going to have it out. I was in town topping off the diesel tank when Glenda called and said, “Harvey you aren’t going to believe this. A man has a remote controlled machine and he has pulled the trailer out onto the road like it wasn’t nothing but a thing.”

Needless to say I called United Rentals and told them I was going to have the Bobcat one more day. Last night I got most of the mobile home nest cleaned up before dark. Between the poison ivy and the concrete the septic tanks and pit are full and ready to be buried. Their location is middle of the front lawn and I see no reason to ever having to dig a post hole etc there.

It’s two thirty and I couldn’t sleep so I’m up doing an update. Today is finish up working the Bobcat and getting it back to the rental yard. Tomorrow morning we will install the R 19 insulation in the attic of the little house. The opening to the attic is too small for the bags of material to fit. So we’re going to use a line and the spring clamp from a working light to snag up a bat of insulation at a time. Glenda will hook the clamp to a bat and then get out of the way. I’ll pull it up into the attic and place it. We only have to do that about seventy times before it gets hot in the attic.

Saturday we go back to the house in Wylie and do some our repair work on the outside, painter is doing the inside magic. Hopefully the house will go on the market within two weeks. Then the serious work begins here at the new place.

I never seem to not be surprised at the wonderfulness of my wife. I’m a hard worker but she’s an even harder worker.

[Lloyd in S.C.]

Harvey, your making me tired..... you and Glenda!

That remote tractor is cool. Bet that makes that job easier when they get in tight places. One of my friends is in the concrete business, his trucks are remote operated. Stand in the back, move the truck, turn the wheels, diect the shoot, etc all from a remote controller. Cool stuff.

Easy on that insulation, gets hot in those attics quickly.

L.

[sam-3]

Good job with all the hardwork. Keep the posts coming.